Friday, April 5, 2013

Rooftop Leaches Of Chicago

I know this has nothing to do with the Yankees, but I had to say something about this bit of news.

I was just reading about the renovations to be done on Wrigley Field, which will cost around $500 million. This includes a new hotel, parking garage, and more night games. What I think is really impressive is that the team has agreed to pick up the tab on the whole project.

This is no small thing for the Cubs, as Rick Reilly recently wrote an article at ESPN.com outlining the negative things that Wrigley Field has done to the Cubbies. Rick went as far as to say Wrigley Field is why the Cubs haven't won there since... forever.

All of the problems Reilly outlined had to do with lost revenue due to the stadium. From not being able to put up advertising, which Reilly estimates could bring the team an extra $30 million a year, to lost money due to not playing more night games that attract better ratings, which Reilly said costs the team like $5 million a season.

What surprised me, and angered me, the most though was when Rick pointed out how much the Cubs lost thanks to people selling tickets so fans could watch games from their rooftops outside the stadium. You ready for this?

Those people that sell tickets, and even season tickets, rake in around $24 million a year. And while the Cubs do get some of that, it's only 17% or $4 million. The Cubs have been forced to allow people, that have nothing to do with the team, to make $20 million a year off of them. How is that even legal? They might as well allow me to record Cubs games, make a highlight video of their season, and sell them on the Cubs official webpage for $49.95 a piece. Although at $49.95 that too should be illegal, as a highlight video of the Cubs season would last approximately two and a half minutes.

Don't get me wrong, Cubs fans still show up in droves. The team was 10th in Major League Baseball in total attendance last season, and that's with the Cubs finishing 36 games out of first place. But Wrigley Field still holds 41,159 people, and averaged just 35,589. That's 5,570 tickets a game that go unsold. And I guarantee you that that number would go down drastically if people had to actually buy a ticket to go inside Wrigley Field to see a live game. That's not chump change the Cubs are missing out on.

That brings me to one thing regarding the renovations I haven't mentioned yet... a new video scoreboard in left field and a large sign in right field. Well those things have made the owners of the rooftops angry. And you know what I say to that? Good! If anybody should make money off of the Cubs, it should be the Cubs. Not some leach that happens to own a house outside the stadium. It sickens me, and it should make the people that run the Cubs feel even worse, that the team gets a paltry 17% of ticket sales on those rooftops.

But that sickness I feel goes even deeper. You see, the owners of those rooftops are threatening to sue. That's right! They say they're going to sue the Cubs for blocking their view.

UGH!

These people don't love the Cubs. Heck, they aren't fans at all. They're money-grubbing leaches that have done nothing to earn that money from ticket sales. They don't pay the players on the field. They don't pay for the coaches of those players. They don't pay for guys like Theo Epstein that run the team. Do they really think they'd make a penny off of the Cubs if it wasn't for the fact their houses are in a convenient location Give me a break!

I haven't invested a single emotion into the Cubbies. Not that I wish them ill-will, but I couldn't care less if the team disappeared from baseball. But I do have strong feelings towards those people that are threatening to sue the Cubs for blocking their rooftop view of the playing field. And those are feelings of hatred. Hatred for a group of people that don't love the game, but are trying to make money off of the game that they didn't earn.

Oh, and if you tell me they earned that money by purchasing the houses or building where you can watch games from those rooftops, I say "tough sh**!" Millions of people make poor investments, and you don't hear one thing about them. So spare me the sympathy I should feel for those leaches in Chicago.